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Teeth sensitivity

11:49 am - 11/20/2009

Last night I fell asleep with Crest Whitestrips Advanced Seal on my teeth for about two hours (the recommended time is 30 minutes). Now today they're super sensitive and constantly hurting, and I can't really drink or eat anything. :( Is there anything I can do to make the pain go away? I already brushed with Sensodyne and took some pain pills. Help!!!

You should call your dentist. After the pain goes away you may want to also get some ACT flouride rinse - it'll help rebuild the protective layers on your teeth that you may have corroded. It's super cheap and it helped me with my general tooth-sensitivity.

Even a smaller amount of hydrogen peroxide can completely ruin teeth, i.e. using only 3% (vs 6%) for 10 minutes a week (vs 30 a week). I did this with regular hydrogen peroxide, not the strips, and now my teeth are completely ruined. I used to have incredibly strong, perfect teeth. Now I'm in constant pain.

out of curiosity, and please tell me if I'm intruding, but how are your teeth ruined? Like, what happened exactly? I have really sensitive teeth adn was thinking of using a hydrogen peroxide rinse b/c I heard it works well.

Not intruding at all. I'm happy to share the story because I really don't want anyone else to go through what I've been through. Here's a timeline because it's a story stretched out over a period of about three years now.

- Growing up, I had Type A alignment (which is considered "perfect" alignment) I flossed twice a day and brushed three times a day. I was very serious about dental health because I had, what all of my dentists considered, to be perfect teeth. They were healthy and strong with no sensitivities. They were perfectly straight, the right size for my mouth, and in perfect alignment. Dentists have actually said that they were proud to work on my teeth, that's how awesome they were. My teeth were one of the few things about my body I'd actually brag about openly.

- When I was 18, I started losing a lot of weight, and I started drinking wine and about eight cups of coffee a day. I was pretty addicted to it. A little while before I turned nineteen, to combat any signs of yellowing, I started using hydrogen peroxide after learning it was the active ingredient in OTC whitening gels. This was in January of 07.

- Someone close to me told me it would ruin my enamel, so I went pretty easy. The thing is that hydrogen peroxide does NOT whiten teeth, the same way salicylic acid doesn't "renew" the skin, it just chemically exfoliates one or two layers and if you leave it on too long it can make your face peel. Hydrogen peroxide ONLY eats at the layers of enamel. As each layer disappears, the teeth appear whiter. That's why hydrogen peroxide seems to give immediate results.

- I only used straight hydrogen peroxide, which is 3% hydrogen peroxide by volume, and only for ten minutes once a week. I did this for about six months, sometimes only doing it once a month or twice a month. I stopped in July when I turned 19 because my teeth were very white.

- In November 07, one of my teeth hurt. It was the bottom left molar -- the one that's considered the first molar (if you go from the gap in the two middle teeth to the left, it's six teeth over). It didn't hurt too badly, just enough to make me think I had a cavity.

The next day at work, I was chewing some gum. I felt a crack. About 1/4 of my molar had cracked open and fallen out. This happened within a period of 20 hours from the initial onset of pain to the crack in the tooth.

- I didn't have dental insurance, and couldn't get it taken care of. It didn't hurt too badly at first, but after about five months, I realized that it was rapidly deteriorating.

- By April 2009, I was in terrible pain. One night, during a veterinary emergency, I was lying with my cat on the couch trying to keep her eyes closed because she'd been anesthetized and passed out before she could close them. I was going to stay up with her all night to keep them closed.

(I actually just posted something about this today. You can read it here. It's about the veterinary emergency, and this particular story takes place the day this screaming fit occurred.)

About thirty minutes after laying down with my cat, completely out of nowhere my pain level rose to a 10 on the scale. It was the most excruciating pain I've ever been in. I immediately started screaming and crying. I was in so much pain I couldn't say anything other than "FUCK!" over and over and pitifully crying, "Please help me."

I was rushed to an emergency room where I just cried and screamed for an hour. They loaded me up with pain medication and gave me an emergency referral to our local low-income medical/dental clinic.

- A month later, when I could get into the clinic, it was revealed to me that six more cavities were developing on the right side of my mouth. We set up another appointment to have my broken molar extracted, but it was a month away.

- A week after this appointment, I had another screaming fit. I had to go to another dentist and pay out of pocket for an extraction.

- I thought this was the end of my pain, but now I have four cavities that are nestled BETWEEN my teeth, one old filling that fell out due to degradation of enamel from the hydrogen peroxide and is now infected, and one more cavity in the molar right above this infected filling-hole. I also have a cavity on the left side of my mouth.

- The dental assistants were all extremely judgmental of me. They thought I just didn't brush. I didn't even KNOW this had all happened because of the hydrogen peroxide. After a cleaning in September, I was feeling very bad about my teeth. She'd said, "I can't believe you don't take care of your teeth. They're so beautiful." I told her I DID take care of my teeth, but she didn't believe me. Feeling bad about it, I said, "Is it okay for me to whiten my teeth?" The assistant responded, "We don't do that here," so I said, "Oh. I just use hydrogen peroxide." A light bulb seemed to go off in her mind and the expression on her face essentially said, "BAW? D:" She asked me how often I whitened my teeth and I told her the truth. She told me the hydrogen peroxide explained all of my problems, that "maybe" one or two cavities could be explained by not brushing due to the sheer amount of pain I was in (when my molar got really bad, it was extremely painful to brush or get any liquid in my mouth), but that, either way, the whitening had indirectly or directly caused everything.

Gah, REALLY? :( I wonder if I also have some kind of underlying medical condition that needs to be addressed. That may have exacerbated it. I have hypothyroidism, and I did do a lot of low calorie dieting for a while. I wonder if these play any part. I doubt the dentist would be able to tell me.

yeah you're just going to have to pop a shit ton of tylenol because nothing will make it go away. this has happened to me a ton of times even after 20 minutes because i don't do it for the full time, and then when i go to sleep that night the pain hits and doesn't go away for 24 hours.

First, call your dentist. I'm late to respond but your dentist might have better advice and they also know your teeth better than any of us.

I am not a dentist, and know little about dentistry, but I think as much as it sucks you might have to wait this one out. I tried a brand of whitening trays that made my teeth sooo sensitive. I kept them on for the full amount of time b/c I figured some sensitivity was normal (the instructions said so!). I couldn't drink warm beverages for about a week. So, for the time being, avoid any cold or hot foods/beverages. They will just make the sensitivity (temporarily) worse. That sucked for me b/c I live for hot tea. For the time being, keep it to softer, room temperature foods and beverages. I dont' know what pain pills you're taking, but Tylenol is actually fairly effective (I take prescription pain pills daily and I mix Tylenol in if it's a worse day). You're already doing good by using Sensodyne. Don't use any sort of whitening strips/products for a little bit. And hope it feels better soon!

Agreed with the pain assessment. I take hydrocodone/acetaminophen daily, and I supplement it with regular acetaminophen. It is the best for tooth pain. I couldn't live without Tylenol; I'd go crazy and hurt someone, probably.